


Why deja-vu is a dangerous thing

by MsCee



Series: The dangers of deja-vu [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Oblivious Derek, Oblivious Stiles, POV Sheriff Stilinski, Police Officer Derek, Stilinski Family Feels, deputy derek is my favorite derek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:07:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsCee/pseuds/MsCee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When something makes his new deputy seize up like only true love can, John Stilinski is prepared tease the ever-living hell out of him. He’s prepared to look up and see some pretty girl with a bit of an edge, with a loud laugh and a bright smile that could coax even his sullen deputy out of his frown. </p><p>What he’s not prepared for is to look up and see a very familiar face ambling towards his desk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Why deja-vu is a dangerous thing

John Stilinski remembers the first time his wife stepped foot into the police station. She wasn’t his wife then, of course, she was a stranger with a bright red sundress and the cutest nose John had ever seen on another human being. John was a deputy then, brand new to the force and paying his dues with piles and piles of backlogged paperwork. Their eyes met over the top of some petty vandal’s arrest record, and John had frozen, tensed up completely, because his wife had just walked into his life.

And he knew it.

Twenty-odd years later and John hasn’t felt that since. That kind of love, you only get it once in a lifetime. John knows he was lucky he ever got to feel that way, lucky he shared that with her for as long as they did. Lucky to have their son to remember her by, his amazing boy with her nose and her smile and her spirit.

John had his moment, so now he sits back and watches others have theirs. He likes to think he’s fairly adept at reading people, mostly because people aren’t nearly as subtle as they think they are. Or maybe it’s the years of keeping up with his son’s tall tales that keep him on his toes. Either way, John knows a lie when he sees one, and he can usually guess what people are feeling before they do.

So when his new deputy tenses up beside him one morning, John huffs out a small laugh, and thinks of his wife. John’s can’t wait to see how Hale handles meeting whoever made him freeze up like that, wonders if it will be anything like John’s stammering mess of an introduction decades earlier. Knowing Hale, the kid’ll probably just scowl, looking uncomfortable and put out and like he never quite grew into his grown-up emotions.

John’s prepared to watch it all, and then tease the ever-living hell out of Hale as soon as the lucky lady leaves. He’s prepared to look up and see some pretty girl with a bit of an edge, with a loud laugh and a bright smile that could coax even his sullen deputy out of his frown.

What he’s not prepared for is looking up to see a very familiar face ambling towards his desk. John blinks. Blinks again. Darts a look towards Hale, who is (as expected) scowling something fierce, eyes locked with the boy headed over. John was prepared to share his story with Hale, reminisce about the day he met the love of his life three desks over from this very spot. He’s not prepared for his son to factor into the story at all.

“Hey, dad!” Stiles’ voice interrupts John’s brain before it sparks out and turns off completely, short-circuiting somewhere around the fact that his deputy is in love with his barely-legal son.

“Derek,” Stiles continues, nodding towards Hale, who returns the nod with a barely perceptible twitch that John decides to interpret as a smile.

John knows that Hale and his son know each other, and have done since Stiles was in high school. He thought they were friends, though, not… He was sure they were friends. In fact, Stiles was the one who convinced John to give Hale a chance on the force, ranting for nearly an hour about why it was such a great idea to have him there. Reasons that ranged from ‘his eyebrows alone will make suspects weep and confess’ to ‘biceps’. That last one was delivered without further explanation, save for some dramatic arm waving that would make Vanna White proud, and a facial expression that was so patently Stiles it made John snort back a chuckle.

God, John was an idiot sometimes.

Then again, he had never seen them together, or he would have realized sooner. He had to cut himself a bit of a break. He had all the clues, but seeing them together connected the dots. Because he’s looking at his son now, looking at the bright spark in his eye and the quirked grin that promises mischief, and it’s so painfully obvious he doesn’t know how he never noticed.

“How’re you enjoying your first day on the force, Sourwolf?”

“Stiles,” Hale growls, a little bit of warning edging into his voice as he darts his own gaze to John, who stares back with a raised eyebrow at the odd nickname.

“What?” Stiles leans over the side of the desk, squinting as he tries to read the case file open in front of Hale upside-down. “I thought the whole point of this police business was bringing Dad into the fold. I mean, it’s kind of what you’re here for, isn’t it? Running all the police dogs out of a job?”

“Stiles,” Hale repeats, but this time it’s less irritated and more resigned, a tone John is intimately familiar with after nineteen years of parenting Stiles.

“Hale isn’t working with the dogs.” John points out, eyes still locked on Hale and projecting his best bad cop vibes. If he can’t intimidate the kid as Stiles’s dad (yet), he sure as hell is going to abuse his position as Sheriff to make sure Hale squirms the appropriate amount.

He’d never stop his son from finding what he and his wife had, but that doesn’t mean he’s not going to try his very best to shake the foundation and watch Hale sweat a little.

“Obviously,” Stiles says with an exaggerated eye-roll. “Dogs hate Derek. Derek hates dogs. If Derek were working with the dogs, you’d never get anything done, because he’d be too busy pissing in a circle trying to- ”

“Stiles!” Derek’s interjection sends John’s other eyebrow rocketing up to meet the first. He sounds scandalized, like he can’t believe Stiles just went there. Where, John is not entirely sure. He feels like he’s missing something, and it’s more than a little irritating.

Especially because he’s apparently been missing a lot, if the looks the deputy is trading with his son are anything to go by.

“More of a cat person, Hale?” John asks, mentally patting himself on the back for being as calm and collected as he is.

Stiles bursts out laughing.

“I don’t mind dogs, sir.” Hale replies, scowling at Stiles.

“Derek and dogs have a special kinship.” Stiles says, nodding like the statement makes any sense whatsoever.

John shakes his head. There is no way in hell this conversation is going to start making sense any time soon.

“Is there anything you wanted, son?” He asks Stiles.

“Huh?” Stiles jerks his head towards John like he just realized for the first time that there was anyone else in the room, his eyes flitting back to Hale a time or two before focusing towards John. “What was that?”

“I asked if there was anything you wanted. You’re at the station. Instead of at work. Normally you’re at work during the day?”

“Oh. Right. I, uh… Nope.” Stiles is looking like a kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar. Another patently Stiles look, since John’s son has a knack for sticking his hand into metaphorical cookie jars.

“Nope?”

“Nope.” Stiles confirms, popping his lips on the ‘p’ and rocking back onto his heels. “Can’t a kid just come say hi to his old man?”

“He can, but he never does.” John notices out of the corner of his eye that Hale is starting to look a little uncomfortable. Which is good, actually, because it means he’s perceptive, and knows what John is getting at. You can train a deputy, but that extra bit of intuition is always something John wants in his team. He’s glad to know Hale’s got it.

“Say, is it nearly lunch time?” Stiles makes a show of twisting his head to look at the clock on the station wall, though John will bet anything that Stiles knows exactly what time it is. “Huh! What a funny coincidence. That I’m here at lunch time, I mean. You packed your lunch, didn’t you, Dad? You should go get it out of the fridge before someone steals it.”

“Let me guess, Hale didn’t bring a lunch?” John can’t help the small smile tugging at his lips.

Stiles’s eyes widen comically, like he’s realizing for the first time that John isn’t a complete moron.

“Uh. No?”

“Uh huh.” John leans back in his chair and crosses his arms across his chest. “And you, being the charitable station mascot that you are, are going to take him out for lunch, since he forgot to bring one?”

“Uh. Yes?”

“Uh huh. And Hale, because he wants to impress his boss, is going to humor said boss’s son by tolerating him over lunch?”

“Uh. Yes?”

“Because there’s no other reason that you and Hale would have lunch together, right?”

“Right?” Stiles blinks owlishly, failing miserably at looking innocent. You’d think by nineteen his son would learn that he has the world’s worst innocent face. Stiles trying to look innocent is as good as a confession that he’s guilty.

“After all, it’s not like you and Hale are dating or something. Which is the only other reason that you’d be coming here on his first day to take him to lunch.”

Stiles is gaping like a fish, and John can’t help but chuckle.

“I think my lunch can wait until tomorrow,” he decides. “I would love to have lunch with my son and hear all about my new deputy’s first day. What d’you say, boys?”

Stiles flails over himself for a second, and John can more or less see him thinking of some ridiculous story to dig himself out of this hole. And in the process, probably dig himself forty times deeper.

Before he can open his mouth, though, Hale is nodding and standing up, walking over to Stiles and clamping a hand over his shoulder.

“It’ll be a good time to tell him,” Hale murmurs.

Well, that was easy, John thinks. They’re clearly ready to come clean to him. He’ll do the expected ‘I’m-his-father-I-have-guns’ song and dance, and then never talk about it again. John is suddenly a bit happier to have Hale on his team. Not many parents get to keep 24/7 tabs on their kids’ boyfriends. Well, maybe not 24/7, but if the two of them don’t think John is going to be watching Hale whenever he’s on duty, making sure he’s good enough for Stiles… Oh, that’s good, actually. He’ll throw that one into the gun speech.

“I was thinking we should do it in private, though.” Stiles mutters back.

John frowns a little at that. Stiles isn’t exactly shy about the people he dates. Unless he’s expecting John to give him a hard time about this, and wants to avoid creating a scene. For a second, John feels a pang of something that Stiles thinks he’s going to freak out about him dating Hale. Sure, he’s not John’s first pick in terms of kids he’d like to see his son date, but it could be worse.

Maybe he’s just going soft in his old age, or maybe the look on Hale’s face when Stiles walked in convinced him that Hale would treat his son right. Just like he did his wife, as best as he could, until the very last minute she was here.

Hale and Stiles are still whispering back and forth, and John tunes back in just in time to hear Stiles cut over whatever Hale had just said.

“What if we need to show him? If we’re alone, we can just show him.”

Wait, what?

“I don’t need to see it! I’ll believe you!” John blurts out before he can stop himself.

Two heads swivel towards him, two nearly identical horrified looks. They stare at each other in some kind of bizarre stalemate for a long moment before Stiles gulps audibly.

“You know?” Stiles asks.

John pulls himself up to his full height.

“You’re not exactly being subtle about it.” He sighs.

Hale looks like he’s about to punch something.

“And you’re not-”

John cuts Stiles off with a wave of his hand.

“I’m not going to shoot him or anything.”

He’s expecting Stiles to laugh at that, to relax at the dad joke. He’s not expecting Hale to flinch and growl, low at the back of his throat like an animal. He’s not expecting his son to tense up _more_ , eyes widening and looking at John like he’s just told him Santa wasn’t real. (Which, incidentally, he never did have to tell Stiles, since Stiles figured it out at seven through an odd combination of library books, bugging every adult who would talk to him, and staking out the living room on Christmas eve.)

“Who have you been talking to?” Stiles hisses, and John’s frown furrows deeper.

“Stiles, your heart is racing. Calm down.” Hale says, and Stiles takes a deep breath and shoots him a dirty look.

“How long have you known, Dad? Why didn’t you say anything? Have you known since… Oh my God, have you known since high school?”

“What?” John can’t help yelling a little. “High school, Stiles? This has been going on since high school?”

“Of course it has!” Stiles snaps. “When did you think it started?”

“After you turned 18, I assumed, because I am okay with you and him being together now, but I refuse to look the other way if he took advantage of you when you were a _minor_!”

They’re totally making a scene now, and John understands why Stiles wanted to do this in private. It had nothing to do with the relationship. They’ve been doing this since Stiles was a _kid,_ and John wants to do nothing more than wring his deputy’s neck for laying a hand on his child.

He’s about to shout something to that effect when he realizes that both Stiles and Hale have fallen dead quiet, looking at each other with round eyes.

“Dad.” Stiles offers after a second of silence. “Do you think Derek and I are together?”

“Stiles and I aren’t dating.” Hale confirms. “I have never touched Stiles in that way.”

John wonders if he’s dreaming, because this situation went from under control to surreal nightmare in five seconds flat. Especially since he knows he didn’t imagine the look of pure disappointment on Stiles’s face when Hale said that.

“Why not?”

Apparently John’s brain and mouth are not yet on the same page, because he did not mean to say that out loud. He absently wonders if this is what being his son feels like. He winces. This is really not how he expected this afternoon to go.

Stiles is spluttering, tomato red, and Hale is frowning at John, looking almost pensive.

“Stiles is very young.” The deputy settles on finally, mouth drawn in a determined line.

“Yes, he is.” John agrees. “But he is an adult. Now.”

“Oh my God Dad, are you _pimping me out_?” Stiles sounds absolutely mortified. Hale is completely silent, still looking contemplative.

John rolls his eyes, but doesn't bother correcting his son. Because as much as it pains him to admit it, it's sort of the truth. John realizes that he has gone from complete ignorance and shock, to resigned acceptance of a relationship that doesn't exist, to playing matchmaker with his son and deputy. All within the span of fifteen minutes.

Well, this would be a good a time as any to change the subject.

“So, how about that lunch? I could definitely use a burger about now.” John claps his hands together with forced enthusiasm, causing Stiles to jump a little.

Hale is still lost in his head. Stiles looks over at him, worried, and John can see a kernel of vulnerability in the look he gives Hale. Figuring they probably need to talk, John starts walking towards the exit. After all, in for a penny, in for a pound.

“I’m sorry about my dad.” He hears Stiles mumble behind him. “I know you don’t-”

“It’s not… Can we talk about this later?” Hale breaks off to exhale noisily. “Maybe over coffee?”

John is pulling open the door when Stiles finally speaks again.

“Like, a date?”

John can see Hale’s reflection in the glass of the police station door, but he doesn’t need to watch it to know that Hale is nodding, eyebrows still pulled into a tight frown.

As he settles into his cruiser, watches his son drift closer to his deputy, he swears he sees a flash of red sundress out the corner of his eye, hears soft laughter in his ear.

 

 

_“Thank you for your help, Deputy Stilinski.”_

_“Uh. John. It’s. My name. Is John.”_

_“Good to know. John. I like that name. Well, maybe I’ll see you around, John.”_

_“I’d like that. Wait. Did you mean here? At the station? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to assume… I thought you meant…”_

_“You assumed right. I didn’t mean here at all. I was thinking more of a coffeeshop ‘see you again’. Maybe the one on Main and Elm? Next Monday?”_

_“Oh. Like a date?”_

_“Yes, like a date.”_

_“I’d like that. I’d really… I’d like that a lot.”_

_“Me too. I think this is the start of something wonderful, John. Something really, really, wonderful.”_


End file.
